The Dum Dum Girls Get Bouncy on Their Latest for Sub Pop, But the Edge Is Still There

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If there is one thing to take from the opening notes of this album, it’s that Dum Dum Girls have come a long way from their humble beginnings in front woman Dee Dee Penny’s bedroom.

The follow-up to 2011’s Only in Dreams and last year’s End of Daze EP, Too True once again finds Penny working with producers Richard Gottehrer and Sune Rose Wagner (the Raveonettes) to create a shiny batch of lo-fi, ’80s-influenced garage rock. Like her band’s previous releases, Too True capitalizes on Penny’s knack for luxuriant songs framed by melodic guitar-pop arrangements and beachy undertones. But where the earlier songs are moody and gothic, Too True introduces a bouncier Dum Dum Girls.

Yet, some edge remains; these songs are for the women wearing leather and smoking cigarettes at the back of the party. Recorded in a New York apartment as well as at East West Studios and Hollywood’s infamous Chateau Marmont, the heart of Too True is still the lo-fi grit that caught our attention on End of Daze—even if Gottehrer and Wagner worked hard to give these songs a sleeker, more glittery sound.